Clutch
by Cicatrick
Summary: NHI 'verse. Han/Leia; Grace Solo; being a young family brings multiple challenges. Some adult situations. First two of four chapters. For the treasured Erin Darroch's birthday, with boundless love, admiration, and respect. You talented, kind, hilarious human, I adore you, and hope you like your present! Everyone shower her gorgeous lush work with reviews today!
1. October 1974 - 1

October 1974 – 1

October 1974

Grace Solo sat on the porch planks, coltish legs folded. In Dottie-knit sweater, jeans and striped socks, she hacked at poster paper with her old craft scissors. Stupid scissors, Grace was in the midst of fuming—snub-nosed and dull. _Baby_ scissors—whenHolly trundled up the steps.

"Heyyy," Grace chided the squat Scots-Lab mutt, when he stopped in the middle of her homework. He wagged his stubby tail in slow time with "Angie," which Grace was listening to over and over on her portable record player because it fit her mood. Grace laughed softly, scratching between Holly's alert, pointed ears. "You're gonna get glue on your paws, goofy."

Tilting his head, Holly whined.

Grace looked sharply up from her laborious snipping. Holly never whined; it was one of the things Dad liked so much about him.

A year ago, when Mama paused in the driveway and said she and Grace were on their way to get a dog, Dad had looked blankly up from under Millie's hood. He had no objection to pets—Dad was never cruel to anything helpless, but he didn't seem to quite _get_ what pets were _for_. He didn't stroke Roget's head the way Grace did, snuggled with the cat in her velvet beanbag chair (that chair, a precious birthday gift from Uncle Lando, was another thing Dad didn't get— _what a...you want a chair, Gee? I'll make you a—_ ) when they all watched _Saturday_ _Night at the Movies_ on NBC. Dad didn't notice Roget existed, really, unless she sat in his open workshop doorway while he worked, chattering her shrill murder-song at birds who might have the nerve to roost in the rafters. Then Dad praised her, gruffly. _Good job, Rog._ As though the tabby was a junior employee at his air-shipping company.

But then Mama planted her size-five feet in the gravel, impossibly stubborn for a person her size. _Transport services are required, Hotshot._ Dadflattened an oil-webbed hand on his chest, denim sleeves rolled up, forearms streaked with black. Half-smirk that made Mama's eyes dance. _Pardon me, Your Worship? Believe you drive just fine._ And Mama shot back—everything she said was fast—that she needed her hands free to hold the dog. So Dad came along, driving Mama's blue '62 Satellite. _Just for the ride, mind,_ he groused every three miles, and in the back seat, Grace rolled her eyes. Just the ride, right. As if she hadn't heard the story of how Dad met Mama a million times.

At the pound, Dad was fidgety, tense. Warily eyeing the regimented cells, the chipped paint and no-name kibble, the aura of despair and eagerness. But he stopped in front of a particular bleak concrete pen. Inside, a little bearded dog with a sweet, lonely, clever face, maintaining his dignity even as he shuddered with hope under human scrutiny. Looking at the dog, Dad's eyes had done their kaleidoscope thing, and Mama's eyes had done their melty-chocolate thing when she looked at Dad looking at the dog. _Whaddaya think, girls?_ Dad asked too casually, one hand hooked in chain-link, other rubbing the back of his neck. _Give this guy a break?_

 _Believe in_ _love at first sight, Han?_ Mama teased on the way home, driving her own car after all. Dad up front beside her. Grace in the back with the small, sturdy dog shivering ecstatically in her arms, stealing grateful licks of her chin. Dad grabbed Mama's hand from the gearshift and kissed her palm, once-twice, growled like some animal himself: _You bet your ass I do, Princess._

Dad won the draw from Mama's sunhat (of course he did, and he was a terrible, gloating winner) to name the new dog. Called him Holly, after the singer he still listened to on the jukebox in his shop. The one whose song Dad used to sing as Grace's lullaby. Not every bedtime, he was more a kiss-your-forehead, gruff _sweet-dreams-baby_ kind of Dad, after Mama read a story, doing all the voices. But when Grace was little, when she was sick or scared, he'd pick her up and walk the floor with her. For hours, if that was what it took. Patting her back and gravel-hum-mumbling it— _sing to me love's story_ —until Grace fell asleep on his wide flannel shoulder.

Now Grace scowled, shoved heavy waves of dark hair behind her ears, the crazy new layers that kept springing from her bun. She would not think nice things about her mother and father. Not today, when she _completely hated them_. Thanks to them, she was stuck with her dopey homework—a family tree she'd actually cut out in the shape of a tree, because Grace Solo was just that hopeless—while her friends, her free, ungrounded, sane-parents-having friends, were getting ready to go out to the movies.

These scissors! Grace tossed them aside. They were too small. Stupid long-fingered Dad, passing on his stupid long fingers. Grace used her own long fingers to crank up Mick Jagger's bawling. Though she strictly curtailed the instinctive flexing of her tough, hard, trained feet to the song, Grace did sing along, emphatically aggrieved. _You can't say we're satisfi—_

Holly whined again. Or did he? A whimper so thin it was maybe exhalation, so Grace returned her attention to her school project, names and birthdates written on orange paper leaves. It looked so...uneven, Dad with his no parents, Mama with too many. Mama had long been forthcoming about her childhood, painful and happy parts alike. She'd discuss anything with Grace, swinging in the hammock together: life, the facts of life (oh god barf), creativity, grief. To discover herself adopted, Uncle Luke's twin, to fall in love with a grouchy stranger— _hey c'mon,_ Dad hollered from his ladder. _I'm a nice man_.

But Grace hadn't yet approached Dad with the sheet of mimeographed questions from Ms. Baird, for all her students to ask their family members. Questions like _Where did you grow up_ and _What's your favorite Grateful Dead song_ (Ms. Baird was a hippie) and _What did your parents do for a living?_ Mama had thoughtfully answered them all, so had Uncle Luke, cheerfully, over the phone from New York. But Dad. Dad—

Dad always got this _look_ whenever Grace, as a small child, asked him stuff that wasn't, say, _how does the radio work?_ When she wanted to know he got his chin scar, or if he'd ever been to war, or if Dottie and Doc were his parents. Not hostile to her, never; despite what her friends thought (especially after last Friday, ugh) Han Solo was gentle. He told Grace the truth, but in such short, pained ways— _it was a stick; yep; nope, but you can go on calling 'em Nan and Pop_ —looking so grim that it was like wrenching something from him, and Grace loved her father. So she stopped prying.

Mama wouldn't explain Dad's childhood either, she was very firm on that, last week when Grace asked.Neither would Uncle Luke. _Not my story,_ _Gracie,_ Luke said, serenely, down the crackling line. _Not fair, Baby,_ Mama gently declined,wrangling a pigweed that was strangling Uncle Chewie's beets.She smiled at Grace from under the brim of her hat, her pretty face rueful, sympathetic yet resolute. _You'll have to talk to Daddy yourself._

Grace had been going to, last night after supper. It made her nervous, especially with him so...what, disappointed in her? but she had to finish the project somehow. But then the phone had rung in the living room, as Grace watched Mary Tyler Moore in her floral pajamas, and Mama packed for her weekend trip to Eisley with Auntie Shara and Dr. Kalonia. Some panel on natural childbirth or something equally revolting. (There was a copy of _Our Bodies, Ourselves_ in Dr. Kalonia's waiting room, ohhh barfity-barf). Mama paused her efficient folding of a cranberry ribbed turtleneck, reached for the phone on the table beside the couch. Eyes keen as she listened, her cheeks paling _._

And Dad, who was on the couch beside her, tinkering with his knife, peered at Mama. They weren't telepathic, not like the twins were, but they had been together forever and they loved each other. Loved each other so much, in fact, that Grace almost—oh, it was dumb, dumb, she knew her parents loved her too, ferocious and true, but they were so close that sometimes Grace felt...left out? Outside Han-and-Leia, their infinite loop.

Maybe because Mama and Dad didn't fight like other couples. The cabin had none of that queasy tension bubbling just undercover in Marilee's grand house; never the overt screaming of Tam's parents that woke Grace one sleepover, before they announced their divorce. Even the Damerons, mostly happy, clashed sometimes, Poe said; his dad could be careless, his mom impatient. But Grace's parents had probably never even _had_ a fight, she thought, oddly resentful. It wasn't like Grace wanted them to split up or anything, the idea made her sick, but—maybe it would make them more approachable, when Grace was in so much trouble, to know not just the love story but that they were flawed. That Daddy wasn't just brave, skilled and devoted, but...selfish, reckless, maybe jealous. That Mama wasn't always brilliant, warm and supportive, but could be vengeful and self-righteous, using her uncanny insight to hurt.

If they were just a little...screwed up, it would make them easier to admit her own problems to.

Speaking of.

Mama slowly set the green receiver to its cradle. _Grace,_ she said, so evenly she could only be deeply upset. _That was Liz Gallagher._

In her beanbag chair, Grace pulled her knees to her chest. She studied her naked feet, bruised and grooved from her pointe shoes. Her toenails violet, navy-blue, a couple half-lost. The flesh hard and thick, calloused, lumpy, cracked. Secretly Grace was proud of her mangled feet, the evidence of her toughness and dedication. The literal bending of bone and tendon to her will. Proof of the weight, the force, of her expression. Hers were nothing compared to Miss Liz's feet, of course: _those_ were far out, and neither of the other serious dancers in class so much as blinked at Grace's damage, they had their own. So it had been a shock when Tam had recoiled at Grace's fifteenth birthday party at the lake, pointed at Grace's toes and shrieked in a way that made everyone look. _OhmiGOD._ _Gross!_ Which of course became Grace's nickname for awhile. _Gross Solo._ Everyone said it so playfully that Grace made sure to laugh, too.

 _Liz said you quit the school talent show?_

Grace wiggled her hammered pinky toe. She been working on her piece for weeks, for the show. Working out her own steps with Miss Lizzie's help, not ballet but exciting modern, set to "Suffragette City." It was Miss Liz, so cool with her feline eyes and infectious laughter, her elevating standards, who got her into David Bowie in the first place. And now her beloved teacher had gone and told Mama what Grace confessed: that Grace didn't want to perform, not after Marilee changed Grace's name on the sign-up sheet _._

When Grace muttered it to Mama and Dad, what Marilee had written: _Gross Soloist—_ Mama flinched.Mama, who eviscerated condescending debate opposition on TV with barely a toss of famous hair, gone speechless with hurt. And Dad? had set about remaking _The Towering Inferno_ with his yellow eyes. Swivelling his knife in his fingers, like he was going to open something's guts.

The name _had_ hurt. And it stuck, at school. Marilee used to dance too, with Miss Liz, though she'd never made it _en pointe_. Still, you'd think she'd know how it felt, dancing—they'd used to have fun on trips in Mama's Satellite, competing at recitals. Grace had thought her friend knew how dance was part of you, thought she felt it too: that movement was the only way to shape it, or _stand_ it, the electricity of life. You'd think she'd—well, it was true, dancing wasn't exactly cool. School dances, yes, but not the kind of work high-level dancing demanded, the camps and destroyed feet, the relentless exercises and injuries. Melting ice and binding cloth, burning liniment, the endless fear for ligaments; the sweat-wrung laundry and Epsom salt baths. The loss of all Saturdays, beat out in counts of three and five and eight.

It was all worth it to Grace when it came true onstage, in light and heat. When it _became_ , when rhythm broke through the ache. When she leapt and was caught in air, when air changed its properties just for her. God. God, it was the reward for all the torture. Grace knew, had always known, how Daddy felt about flying, that was one thing she'd never had to ask him. In the air, you were both humble and immortal.

But this past summer, when her friends wanted to stay out late but Grace had to be up at five o'clock to get to Eisley in time for a recital, or when she missed inside jokes because she was away a week every August to teach dance at the arts camp Uncle Luke volunteered at, the preciousness had begun to slip and fade. The warm nights Marilee and Tam spent riding in cars, or in backyards when parents were away, seemed so much easier, to Grace. More urgent, more _now_. Not a point on a calendar, not a set of exercises, not Miss Liz running counts over and over and over and over. The inch-by-inch increments, adjustments of thigh and knee and ankle. _Hips off on three. You came in late—wait, that was it, girl, fantastic!_

Whether it was late or great, the end result was the same: _do it again, Grace. Again._

Yeah, Grace hated her friends' music, "Piano Man" and "Rocket Man" and the Bay City Rollers. The senior athletes they partied with laughed wet and mean and smelled like goats. _Heyyyy, Gross._ So beer tasted like a penny pulled from a pickle jar, so what? She could learn to like it, all of it, she—

Because surely then life would get easier, the attention would stop: the comments about her gross feet, her height and snobby posture, her hair always up in its bun. Her legs—gangly to some, too muscular to others, but always wrong, so wrong Grace stopped wearing her cutoffs last summer unless she was at home, hanging out with Poe. Poe was like her big brother, he looked out for her, over vacation they listened to records, laughed and talked and swam in the lake. But back in school, he was a grade older and beautiful in a way that took no prisoners. Poe wore himself with so much confidence, eyeliner and silver t-shirt, photography portfolio and radio headphones, that no mockery could reach him. He wanted Grace to be the same way, and was nice but faintly incredulous when she was not. When she admitted to him, and only him, her bruised feelings. _So drop 'em._ _They're mean, mediocre, predictable, dull,_ Poe dismissed on their way to the school darkroom. _You're an artist, Grace._ And that was it, matter settled. As though his judgement sucked the venom from any hurt.

But Grace admitted no hurt to her parents last night, side by side on the old yellow couch: Dad's jaw tensing and his eyes hot; Mama gutted and small, surrounded by her stylish clothes.

Her parents.

It was _safe_ to tell her parents, Grace knew that. They were both smart, kind, they adored her, had never pushed her into dance, just girded her own ambition. Their expressions begged her to talk to them. She could say it: _I'm going to quit dancing._

But she could _not_ say it. Because then Han-and-Leia would get all Leia-and-Han. From Dad, there'd be swearing and solving. And from Mama, the empathetic press for the true story, which she got no matter what. And the truth stuck in Grace's throat. How did you ask it, as the only child of Han-and-Leia: _Am I dumb? Am I ugly?_

 _Fuck 'em all,_ Dad spat at last, pointing his index; Mama still wounded into rare muteness. _Fuck 'em, jealous, you go get it—_

It was already starting. Swearing, solving, and Mama's chin was setting itself. So Grace didn't dare tell them, or ask them, anything. Instead she mustered all her formidable bodily control to unfold, like some pliable, slender stalk, from her seat. Put on Marilee's cool laugh. _It's just a joke!_

From the kitchen, biting into a pear, she'd heard Mama's murmur. _She's...oh. Maybe I should stay ho—_

 _Naaah, Sweetheart. Can't teach her surrender._ A squeak of couch-springs, Dad leaning over to pull Mama close. _Do your thing. She'll be fine._ Audible kiss of head. _Tough as boots, our kid._

 _She's a teenager, too._ Mama sighed. _Those_ friends _she's..._ The richvoice shook. _Oh, Han. I hate it, I_ hate _it for her._

 _I'll, uh. Talk to her._ Hope, nerves and determination in Dad's tone. _Whaddaya think, maybe I'll take her to Chewie's? Know Gee's in the doghouse, no goin' out, but—gotta eat, huh? Diner always cheers her up._

The diner. Where Uncle Chewie would hug Grace, give her extra-crispy fries and a chocolate shake. Dad would drink black coffee, slide her dimes for the little booth jukebox.She'd play songs he liked and sometimesDad would get a little misty and he'd have to get up, hope Chewie had broken something lately. Oh Daddy, so earnest beneath his hard hide. Forever thinking she was five instead of fifteen.

Mama, too. She had left, earlier this afternoon. But not before she held Grace close, pulled her endearingly low to kiss her forehead. _Not finished, Baby,_ Mama whispered.

There was no escape, not from Han-and-Leia.

Maybe it would be easier, Grace thought now, eyeing her own solitary leaf, if she had brothers and sisters. She'd feel less like...like...some footnote to true love.

Most Grace's classmates had siblings; lots, even. Their family trees probably didn't fit on their posters. The baby boom, they were calling her generation on the news and at school. But she was a sole child, and while it had never bothered her before, today Grace felt a melancholy doubt. Not competitive exactly, yet a gnawing thought.

A boy, a brother? Would Dad have liked a son? Not _instead_ of Grace, never, but...as well as her? A kid who loved all the things Dad did, planes and engines and making things out of wood. Grace _did_ play pool with him, she was good, too. Good enough to beat Wedge, to Dad's delight: _hell,_ _you just don't_ learn, _Antilles._ Dad had taught Grace countless practical skills with no regard at all for the divisions others instilled between genders. But Grace also couldn't number the times people had expressed sympathy to her father, in one way or another, that such a _man's man_ (a phrase guaranteed to make Mama grind her molars) had only a daughter. Almost nothing was guaranteed to make Daddy flare up faster, set Mama to blistering ice, but it happened. A lot.

It _was_ odd, though. Wasn't it? That Mama and Dad stopped at one kid? Even Marilee's and Tam's parents, who hated each other, had several children. And it wasn't like the Solos never... _ugh_ , but...okay, every year, while Grace was at Luke's camp, Mama took vacation from the paper and Dad flew her wherever he happened to go for work. Grace used to think, when she was younger, that her parents really wanted to visit Cincinnati, Des Moines, Chicago. But at fifteen, Grace was pretty sure the pair barely left their hotel. There was a way Mama sounded just this last August when she called the camp from Racine to say goodnight to Grace, to give an emergency phone number; all dizzily distracted. A warm low mumbling in the background that wasn't…far enough in the background. _Barf._

So if they...still.. _.that_ , if they always _had,_ then why...

Grace sighed. Well, tough luck, perfect lovers. They were stuck with one gawky, monster-footed, awkwardly rebellious daughter.

"Tell Dad it wasn't my fault," Grace murmured to Holly, setting her forehead to his fuzzy brow.

But she knew it was _no dice,_ as Dad had barked last Friday night, when Grace tried to explain on the drive home, tongue thick and clumsy, through hiccups. _I didn't. Mean. To have so much._ Mama waiting on the porch, perched like a small, vigilant bird on the wooden bench—or maybe a wise witch, Holly at her feet and Roget sitting sentry beside her. When Millie pulled up Mama stood in the quivering lamplight, tightening her pink housecoat. Huge worried eyes even huger as Grace stumbled out of the passenger door. Dad caught her by her elbows, before she fell to the gravel drive. Grace almost cried with the crazy urge to put her feet on Dad's boots and let him walk her, like he used to when she was tiny, to "She Loves You."

Gathering Holly into her lap, Grace winced, thinking of her friends again. They'd ragged her all week at school, prissy jewel-box ballerina getting dragged out of a party drunk by her father. Though they damn sure hadn't laughed at Han Solo. Stalking like atigerinto Tommy Dell's backyard, glare strafing over all the kids jumping to "Ballroom Blitz." Tommy trying to be slick, going red with shock, sitting by the pool with Marilee on his lap and someone else's lipstick on his neck. _Wow hey, hey Mr. Solo, we were just—_

 _Shut up,_ Dad had said, pointing at Tommy, not slowing or looking over. He found his objective in the crowd at once: the too-tall girl with too much hair (she'd let Marilee layer it with kitchen scissors before they went out, and now it was _huge_ ) and too much of Tam's makeup, in a too-big halter dress and her own rainbow sneakers, for once the one _not_ dancing. Standing by the keg, red cup in her fingers. _Hey Solo cup,_ kids were calling her, but for once the jokes felt fine. _Yeah yeah yeah yeah laugh it up,_ Grace said good-naturedly, as her cup got filled again with cheap, soapy beer.

 _Grace._

Dad didn't yell, and that was the scariest thing, the thing that made brawny letter-wrestler Tommy shrink back into the patio lounger. Dad's voice was calm but huge as the sea, somehow carrying over The Sweet blaring from Tommy's parents' hi-fi.

 _Get in the truck. Grace. Right now._

Not _Baby,_ not _Gee_. Last Friday night, in front of the crowd, that had been a relief. But now Grace's slanted lips trembled, and she pressed her face into Holly's scruffy, sun-dusty fur. To keep from crying, she stoked her anger. Remembering how Mama had brought Grace ginger ale and stroked her mangled hair after she threw up for an hour. But Dad had gone out to his shop, midnight, thrumming with—what, fury? Disgust?

At breakfast the next morning—Grace too green for the ham and eggs Dad was frying—Mama said Grace was grounded. Grace had never been grounded! _That's not—! For how long?_ she'd wailed. _This ain't a negotiation,_ Dad snarled, over his shoulder, rattling cast-iron like some jailer. _Well,_ Mama said, more reasonably, handing Grace a banana, _this is quite serious, Grace. You lied to us, abused our trust._ _We'll see after two weeks._

Now, one week into her sentence, Grace thought of her friends again. They'd all been at the party too. Drank all the time, Grace only ever got drunk the once. Yet they were free and at the afternoon matinee, Marilee and Tam had been talking about it at their lockers. Not that she was dying to see _Herbie Rides Again_ , but Grace just _knew_ they'd sneak in to see _Thunderbolt and Lightfoot_ instead and oh, Jeff Bridges was _cute,_ not like any of the goaty boys she knewand here Grace was, cutting out stupid _shapes_ with safety scissors that were too small for her freakish hands!

Grace leaned over the Dad-leaf, erased the pencilled _Han,_ inked in _Henry._ Dad hated that name, didn't answer to it whenever anyone called him that, but that was what it said on his driver's license, Grace self-righteously told herself. Well, whatever he went by, Dad _was_ her impossible father; her cowlicky hair and sulky angled lips were proof of that. She might as well go find him, get this dumb project on the road. At least, being this mad at him—it was all _his_ fault, he had to actually crash the party? Ruin her life in front of everybody?—it wouldn't bother her to hold his huge feet (thanks a lot for those, too, _Henry_ ) to the fire with her question sheets.

"Where's your buddy?" Grace asked Holly, arching a fine eyebrow.

And Holly barked, high and sharp, like he'd thought Grace would never ask.


	2. October 1962 - 1

October 1962 – 1

October 1962

When he'd heard, from an exasperated Doc, that New Hope airport's insurance carrier was requiring all pilots to receive psychological clearance, Han Solo had shrugged. Figured it'd be like his draft hearing, where he could've shown up in a clown suit slung with guns of his own and still be stamped 1-A, shunted off to eastern Asia.

And the process _was_ that simple, it seemed at first. On Wednesday the shrink hired by Reliable Underwriters came out to the hangar, worked through the pilot roster in alphabetical order. Forest firemen, crop dusters, rescue fliers; Doc's other shippers, Barrow and Gatley, stamped fit for the sky within the day. _No sweat, Solo,_ Barrow had said outside, kicking the tires before he hit it for Boise, quick easy run that was supposed to be Han's. _Dr. Fowler is a real nice guy._

On Thursday, Han was shoulder-deep in Cessna guts. The parts just weren't fitting, rare in Han's hands, and Han blamed the radio—he liked working to music but this was news, always news the last few weeks. Grave tones cutting into rock-and-roll, ruining the rhythm of Han's fingers.

Bad shit out of Cuba.

Han didn't want to hear any more. He made a point of avoiding the news, funny he knew for the husband of a reporter, but Han didn't think of Leia as a reporter. More a writer who was...a spy by night. It was easy to imagine, made Han smile: Leia setting the world right in a catsuit like Emma Peel's on _The Avengers_. Yeah, ponytailed Leia in black leather: _zippered,_ collarbone to nav—

A bulletin severed "Be My Baby," which had been serving as pretty great soundtrack to Han's mental pictures of Leia, boots and arch of brow, silver pull in her fingers. Christ, Han thought with a twist of tilted lip, phrases like _fallout shelter_ and _nuclear-tipped warheads_ had a way of cooling a guy's sweet-dreaming.

 _Spy plane._ Han scowled. That was no fun to conjure, either, despite his love of aircraft and private jones for Leia-as-secret agent. _Khruschev_. _Kennedy brothers._ Ahhh,it was all like some sport he didn't watch _—_ rich guys vs. dictators, the beauty of flight used for idiot squabbles—shit, it always ended in broke kids at wa—

Han slipped his grip on his specialized wrench, and it clattered deep into the engine. Swearing blue fire, he bent far over, rummaging in and under unyielding metal.

The cough behind him made Han leap almost into next week. He caught his right palm on a fanblade as he came up, making him inhale, sharp. At first the deep wound was blanched, but Han knew better. Had no time to get to his clean rags and wrap it before blood streaked his bare forearm like some damn horror flick and—

"Hello."

Han turned. Figured the man behind him for early fifties, tanned. Ruddy hair, open-necked shirt, left hand in the pocket of his chinos. Blue eyes, crinkles at the corners that looked...applied, like they were ordered from the Sears catalogue.

Typical salesman! The guy extended his right hand to shake.

Han blinked. Gore still pouring from the palm of his own. It took real effort to hold back his scorn, to bite his tongue— _I already got a couple blood brothers, thanks_ —and the thing of it was the carpetbagger seemed to _know_ ; he looked amused, interested in what Han would do.

"Just a sec," Han said tightly, passing the guy on his way to the first-aid kit, bolted to the wall outside Doc's office, across the hangar.

Both hands back in his pockets, the man followed. A tall guy too, he kept up, and his relaxed pace—his affable nods to the other guys—made Han's gait seem jerky, rushed, his manner suspicious and closed-off.

"Hoo, that's some cut," the salesman said, peering over Han's shoulder. Like a guy on a bus, sneaking peeks at his seat-mate's newspaper. "You hurt yourself a lot?"

He was grinning, just making conversation, but his eyes flicked to Han's chin. Han wished he had a Chewie-style beard, or even a fake one, attached to plastic nose and glasses.

"You _get_ hurt sometimes, this line of work." Han pulled the white tin box off the wall left-handed, setting it to a steel workbench. Snapping it rapidly open with his left thumb, one clasp then the other.

" _I_ do?" The clean tenor voice was playful, but pointed.

Han tugged a single-use vial of iodine from its groove in the foam insides of the kit. "You _would,_ " he grunted, tearing the stopper out with his teeth, spitting it to his feet. He doused his palm with the antiseptic, relished the distraction of the sting. "If you were in this line of work."

The man tilted his head, watching with interest as Han opened a butterfly bandage, also with his teeth, and slapped it into place.

"That's not exactly hygienic," he offered.

With a savage grin Han flexed his fingers, testing the adhesive. "Oh, good. You're a _doctor,"_

The chuckle came entirely unbothered. "The human mouth is—"

Han shrugged, released his fist. "S'my mouth," he tossed over his shoulder, striding back towards his station. With a raise of brows at Gatley, the man stayed put.

"Wrong way," he called.

Han turned back. "Huh?"

The salesman smiled. "I just got finished with Rossetti."

"Rossetti. Good guy."

"Sure. But more to the point—his name begins with _R._ "

"So?"

"Sssssso. I'm Jack Fowler." The man extended his hand again. "I _am_ a doctor. You and me, Mr. Solo, have a date."

XXXXXXXXX

Han didn't watch _This Is Your Life,_ though it always choked Chewie up. He wasn't interested in _people,_ their hows and whys; what they could have been, their experiences and motivations. He avidly read manuals and specialty magazines, but never the novels, biographies, interviews and archives Leia devoured. Han didn't even read Leia's column, at first, which he hadn't realized hurt her until he saw how her face filled with light when he asked, on a whim, if she'd read it to him, while he worked in his shop. Because he loved her voice, he loved her thoughts, he loved her way of telling stories where he got absorbed, didn't want them to stop. He loved the way Leia sat on the edge of his pool table, swinging her beautiful bare legs as she read.

But that was Leia. She was magic. He'd long stopped questioning that.

Han spent little time reflecting on his life, either. As far as Han was concerned, now was now, and his now was...hell, it felt wrong to even _name_ it. Why would he want to poke at that? Try to label it: passion, trust, happiness, desire? Fulfilment? Humor? They all fit and they all fell short of his depth of feeling. Why would he want to peel that back, the beautiful skin of what he had with Leia?

 _Grace._ Luke had named it best, when he named Han and Leia's baby.

He loved them too much to talk it over. Han loved them too much, his wife and daughter. And so he sat, steely and mute in a rickety aluminum chair in a small abandoned office off the hangar lunchroom, arms folded across his chest. Eyeing Dr. Fowler warily, though Han knew what he should aim to project was, say, relaxed competence. Humility. A dash of cutup charm. Intelligence, not so much to threaten, but enough to appreciate the good doctor's insights. They liked to be of assistance, these types, Han remembered from the army. If you withheld that, your reverence for their wisdom, well, that's when the ol' headshrinkers got nasty.

And that was not one bit of good. Because this doctor, no matter how Han vowed to keep him doggedly separate from wife and daughter, held another love of Han's life in his tidy fingers. College ring, there. Wedding band.

Freedom. Flight. Fowler could ground Han Solo just like that.

But it didn't go so bad. In fact, it went alright at first: name, birthdate. Birthplace. Military service. Yes, a married man. Yes, a father. Friends, ideal career. A good life. A good American mom-and-pop life.

Speaking of.

"Are your parents still living?" Fowler asked. Not with any especial emphasis, either. Read the question off a list, so it wasn't even personal.

And Han did a stupid thing. Inexplicable; maybe immoral, even. _The_ stupidest thing since he'd worked on the docks, ran hooch through crates for a guy name of Jeb Hutt. He didn't know why he took the shortcut, he never consciously meant to do it; it just came out of his mouth before he thought it through.

 _Yes._

Han heard himself say it, syllable final and sick as a break of bone.

But his face didn't change at all. Neither did Fowler's. The shrink leaned back in his metal seat, lacing his hands behind his head. Small half-moons of sweat darkening his linen undersleeves. Han, steel-toes planted flat on the floor, felt his own sweat break at his spine. Felt, watching Fowler tilt lazily back to tap the wall behind him, an absurd sense of proprietary violation—that was _his_ move.

And because it _was_ his move, Han knew what it meant. Fowler smelled the lie. He was smarter, this guy, than Han had guessed and mockingly late it sounded in his head, his internal mantra when he'd hustled nine-ball, poker. _Don't get cocky._

How had _that_ man been smarter? Keeping his impassive expression nailed on, inside Han railed at himself. Not even a man—a boy, a drunken, hungry, fucking-his-way-through-Baltimore _boy,_ and even that boy-Han had known better.

But there was still time. Still time to correct himself, to act as though it had all been some simple misunderstanding— _oh, still living?_ My _parents? No. Never. Not sure they existed at all—_

Han snapped his mouth closed. He was being paranoid. This guy didn't care, what difference did it make, if Han Solo of New Hope, Indiana had parents or not? Fowler was here to do one job, shunt pilots through. Make sure no one sat down and proclaimed himself the Angel of Death. Fowler probably wouldn't bother pursuing it further. And it wasn't even a lie, necessarily, Han wheedled himself. After all, his father could be alive and well. His father could be—hell, Joe damn Kennedy, for all Han knew. He—

"Where they at?" Fowler asked almost idly. "Your ma and pop?"

 _Pop_. Han winced, slightly, at what Grace called Doc. _Doc._ His boss. Counting on Han Solo to run to Philly at six p.m. Monday.

"Boca Raton," Han said promptly, and _what. The fuck?! Solo? Boca—_ wellhell, he was sure lying now. He almost burst into bitter laughter, but not because he was proud, or enjoying this—this was despair. Bargaining with a higher power. _Just let it end. Let it end, and I'll repent after._

"Wow. Nice. Retirement?" Fowler asked. His voice still that mild, soothing beige. "Shuffleboard, turquoise water?"

Han smiled, thin and sickly. "Great, yeah. Good people. Good folks. Good...y'know, mother and fath..."

Dr. Fowler swung his oxfords to the floor. An energetic man, Han saw then, probably a letter athlete wherever he'd gone to college. Fowler pulled a manila file from a stack. Thick. A4 paper. Smudged carbon copies edging out.

Opening the file, the doctor swivelled it to face Han. Not with smugness, which is what Han would've expected—what Han maybe deserved, or—yeah, had felt himself, to devastate an opponent. _Nine-ball. Isolder._ And at the sight of the photograph on top, something gave in Han's guts. Plunging him levels, lives, until he hit some pit in himself, hot and dark as a basement laundry.

While Han had never seen the picture, he knew his own damn face alright, no matter what stranger helped make it. Yeah, there he was in stark black-and-white. Holding up a sign inked with name and date. Like he was a perp being booked, but in actuality young Henry Solo was hitting the bricks: it was July 9, 1950. His exit shot from Corell.

Ah Jesus.

He'd had no idea it _showed_. Even as a man of thirty he'd still thought, until confronted with his eighteen-year-old self, Han still thought he was—hell, born hiding it all, hid it so good he didn't even feel it. But here it was, raw in his thinner, yet softer face, in his seething eyes. Plain as the surly curl of lip, as the still-fresh gash on his jaw. Pain. Damage. Hatred. Loneliness.

Shame.

And Han closed his eyes. Thought, then, of Leia's filing cabinet at home, in her bright study. He'd made it for her, cherrywood he'd sanded to the silk of her skin. She kept it meticulously organized. Filled with files just like these, arranged according to some private classification, evidence of her elegant and original brain. So orderly that even to look on the rows made Han feel...clean.

 _Leia._ How to tell this to Leia? What he'd done? He might be out of a fucking job, right now. Over. Doc was bad enough, but Leia, oh. _Leia,_ who scorned liars—how had this even— _Sweetheart, listen, I—_

Opening his eyes, Han met Fowler's blues. Whatever waited here, from him, better get it through. Escape the wave of ugliness, guilt and fear inside himself, at least. And Dr. Fowler leaned forward, resting his tented fingers on either side of the folder. Nowhere near young Han's rage-filled image. Respectful, Han thought, numbly. Probably the kind of guy who never walked on graves.

"Han," Fowler said, his voice gentle and firm. "I'm going to have to see you tomorrow."

XXXXXXXXX

Leia popped Grace into the playpen so she could start dinner. Gently peeling loose clamped fingers, resisting Grace's indignation: "I not baby, Mama. I not a baby!"

Grace was right, of course, and Leia would like to let her loose, but lately Grace got all over the house in the time it took to open the Frigidaire. She was three—an age, a great and terrifying age, where curiosity outstripped any budding judgement of her own safety. On flat, thick, inflexible leather straps that Grace could not possibly wrap around her neck, Han had rigged an alarm that he unslung from hooks at the top of Grace's bedroom door when she slept, so she couldn't escape without alerting them ( _And you laughed when I found cowbells at the Tosche,_ Han softly accused last month, hazel eyes sly, delighted and hot as Leia backed him up the stairs to their bed during Grace's nap).

Grace wasn't crying, just fussing for her way: "Mama. Mama song? Mama _dance_. Mama!"She was used to Leia playing music after the five-thirty news report, but tonight that report was extended. Leia turned the news broadcast louder, distractedly chopping onions, browning ground beef, pulling tomatoes canned by Chewie from the cupboard. She couldn't open these jars herself, but Han was due home any minute– they'd get supper done and then Leia could get into her study, back to work. Mon Mothma had called a rare evening telephone meeting of all the _Gazette_ staff; she'd got a feeling, the editor said gravely, that this standoff was developing faster than anyone expected.

XXXXXXXXX

Han swept in from the blustery evening just as The Isley Brothers blew into "Shout" on the radio. This tandem glamour made Grace's huge gray eyes flare still wider, made her reel, a little, on her felt-bootied heels. Han pulled Leia close as he always did, grinned down at her as he always did, but Leia could feel tension in the set of his shoulders, and the unconscious gnaw at his lower lip said that the bulletins Leia had been following were on at the hangar, too. Doc was, like Han, not a man for current events but this was something unprecedented, something else.

"How was–" Leia began, squeezing his elbow, but Han cut her off with a quick, hard kiss. A briskness came off him that was not entirely the chill of October air as he popped the jars for Leia then moved to the playpen, shrugging off his bomber jacket. Normally when Han came home in the evening, he knelt to make faces at Grace through the bars he'd lathed himself, five minutes or so, then joined Leia in making dinner. He saved real playtime for after they ate, so as not to disrupt the pattern of their evening, the beats that led Grace toward bedtime. But tonight Han bent, swinging Grace up from the pen, swinging her up and out the full length of his arms. And Grace chirped her triumph, as her father tossed her high and caught her to the rhythm of the raucous song on the radio.

And Leia was laughing too, at first. Grace was rosy in her blue sweater, dark braids flying out behind her. Han ginning up at her. Leia knew, better than anyone, how contagious Han's natural energy was– but the playing went on and on. Almost as though, Leia thought, Han was afraid to leave Grace, to turn his back on her.

"Han," she said lightly. God, the music was loud. The onions close to burning. And Grace? Was laughing so hard she was almost mauve.

"Han." Leia said. "Okay, that's—"

He either ignored her, or didn't hear her. Leia's fingers tightened on her spoon. She had to raise her voice. _A little bit softer now,_ the Isley Brothers seemed to mock her. "Han!"

As the song quieted and slowed, Han turned easily to her, gently jouncing Grace on his narrow hip. "Yeah, Princess."

"Would you please—"

But the song ramped up again, vocals screaming: _A little bit louder now,_ everything rising in volume and pressureand Han was swinging Grace again, grinning but were his eyes a bit frant—

Her own eyes like stars, Grace almost swooned in glee with each elevation. "Louder," she howled. "Louder!"

" _Han,"_

"Take it easy," Han sang. Sang along innocently with the song, but his eyes cut playfully to Leia. "Take it easy..."

And this was the trap, Leia thought: did she become the heavy, storm in and wreck the fun—and Han _was_ fun—or did she allow—

Before she could decide, the six o'clock news crackled from the transistor speaker and Han put Grace back into the pen. Stunned with fun, the gale-force fun that was _Daddy._ No struggling now, Grace dazedly chattered to her stuffed grizzly.

Han finally joined Leia at the stove. Took the spoon from her hand and stirred the tomato sauce, cool as you like.

 _Speaking to the press yesterday, President Kennedy–_

And, piqued, Leia said, quietly, that she didn't want Grace to think that her father was all fun while her mother was the one who cracked the whip. She _was_ frustrated, though she didn't mean it as a scold, more negotiation. But Han was clearly stung. His eyebrows knit above the spoon at his lips; he hissed as he burned his tongue.

 _Castro insists–_

"It ain't me bein' Fun Dad," Han said. "You say she's…like me." Han looked at Leia swiftly, his expression a complicated mixture of pride and apprehension. Leia nodded—it was true. She was deeply bonded with her daughter, but Grace and Han shared a corporeal dialect, something akin to what Leia had with Luke. No one could make Grace laugh like her father could; no one else understood, quite so fast, what it was she'd demand from life next. When Leia marvelled at how he guessed just the thing to build Grace– like a tiny set of double-sided steps that she climbed up and down, over and over again– Han always said, _I know what she'll want because it's what I wanted._

Well _he_ , Han said as he drained spaghetti from the pot, steam almost obscuring his face, _he_ threw himself at any imposed limit. Picked locks before he was six. He didn't want Grace to be attracted to—to…broadly Han swept his arm to encompass the staircase, the blue flame on the stove, the knife in Leia's hand, the lake and woods in the dark beyond the kitchen window. "Leia, y'know, the…the damned blender… _because_ they're no-go zones. Right?"

 _Khrushchev declares–_

"That's not the same. You picked locks because you were hungry," Leia countered."Han. You told me, they were locking away _food_ **.** They were locking _you_ –"

Han's look turned flinty and antic at once. Leia tried to catch his eyes but they were like flat stones tossed at the lake. With a sigh she leaned down to pick up Grace, to strap her into her booster for supper. This was a restraint Grace resisted at the best of times, and only willingly entered with the allure of immediate food. She squirmed as Leia swung the tray out of the way (Han built the seat, it really was ingenious) and lowered her.

"It's spaghetti, Baby," Leia said. "It's your favo–"

 _The levels of tension between Washington, Moscow and Havana rise. Bobby Kennedy–_

Han scowled so hard his face contorted. The retraction of all that expansiveness shared with Grace. He pawed the small radio from its hook.

"Han! I'm _listening_ to–"

"Can't stand it," Han muttered. "All the…the…" He gave the dial a savage twist. _Walk like a man, talk like a—_ Frankie Valli commanded in his shrill falsetto. Grace, electrified, kicked her long legs—there was never music during supper!

"Dad Dad Daddy! Dad," Grace called, reaching for him, thinking the music meant a return to play.

"Han," Leia snapped. She didn't normally snap but then, Han did not normally undermine her. Han did not have a flailing three-year-old in his arms, one who needed to be fed, then bathed, then put to bed, then read to before Leia could call into work.

 _No woman is worth–_ shrieked Valli. Han winced at the stabbing whine, swiping again for the dial. "I _hate_ that guy," he said to Leia, with brusque amazement.

"Dad," Grace demanded. "Dad!"

And Han's face went furious and set. As though the fate of the world depended on him getting all the voices off the air. Out of their kitchen. At once. But Han's capable hands were slick with steam, one of them bandaged. He slipped his grip.

Baby blue Bakelite shattered on the floor.

Grace wailed.

"Han," Leia cried. "What in the world?"

XXXXXXXXX

Well, he'd _meant_ to tell her, Han beseeched the Leia in his mind. He'd meant to. Before supper. Then during supper. Then after. But after the disaster that was supper, the broken radio, after getting Grace settled and Leia's marathon phone call, she was exhausted. And all Han got out, as they fell into bed, was that he had to be back at work tomorrow at eleven in the morning.

He felt Leia stiffen against his ribs.

Han knew why. He had Tuesday and Friday mornings off. Always. They were sacred; Leia went to work at seven, came home at noon, and he stayed with his daughter. He loved these mornings with Grace, planned his trips around them. Everyone at the hangar knew Solo wouldn't fly out until after one, those days.

"Han. I work on Fridays—"

He nodded, trying to ignore his throbbing, cut palm. "Yeah, I—"

"Why?"

He took a breath. "Well. Thing is." _I'm an idiot?_ "This, uh, guy came by, and—"

Leia sat up, just a silhouette, chilling his side with her sudden separation. "No."

He sat up too. _"No?_ Whaddaya—"

"I mean, no. I _mean,"_ Leia said, "we have an agreement, Han. A system. You work _X_ times, I work _Y,_ and—"

"Yeah, but," Han said, pushing up on an elbow, "Today I, uh. I hit _Z_. Okay? Sweetheart?"

"Your work is not more important than mine."

"Shit, Leia, I know that," Han said, falling to his back. "This is a one-off. I promise you. Can you cut me some..."

There was a long pause, in the dark.

"Fine." Leia said, clipped. She lay back too, arranged the blankets. "Eleven o'clock. Shara's got the day off. I'll ask her if she minds if you drop Grace there."

"Thank you," Han said, and meant it.

"Han." In the rustle of blankets, he felt Leia turn to search his face. Han was grateful for night. "Is everything all right?"

And this time, when he opened his mouth, nothing came out. No lie.

Not truth, either.

He knew it wasn't fair, Han wanted to say to Leia later. Lying beside her, still awake, listening to her even breathing. They _did_ have a deal, about work. They did have a pace to their evenings. He was the one who fucked it up and now he hadn't even explained why, or how. He just came home and set their kid to _monkey._ He broke Leia's blue transistor. He'd bought it for her at the Tosche only just after they found out she was pregnant, and she was sick. Little thing, just to set by the bed, just to cheer her up. To show he thought of her, appreciated her.

And Han did. Lord knew he loved Leia. Needed her so much his heart seemed to beat uneven, tonight, under the weight of—what?

All he couldn't speak of. Not any of it: not today's impulsive lie. There was too much, suddenly, in the way. Laundry shifts, hot caustic basement, fistfights, hunger, nothing ever _his._ Shrike and the cane, other women, the thin blanket and lumpy pallet did not belong here, in their warm bedroom—it was so far _behind_ him so why did Han burn, just now, with the—

 _No._ He wouldn't allow it. He wouldn't recall it. He'd smash it if he had to, just like the accidental end to the blue Zenith. He was not a child, and this man—Leia's husband, Grace's father?—well, he simply would not remember. This Han Solo had forgotten it all.

But it came back.

Later that night it came back, in the form of a dream that bolted Han straight. He woke half-stumbled out of bed, guttural refusal in his throat, _nnnuuunnnuuhh._ Still seeing row upon row of white metal cots and in one of them– _where?_ – his wailing, terrified baby girl, no no, not gone, not lost, not _ever_ that life for h—

Leia brought him back, tender and scared and brave, wrapping herself around his bare torso from behind. Nightgown riding up her thighs. Palms to his chest, calves locked at his waist, her cheek to his spine. Han sat on the edge of the bed, hand peaked at his eyes, breathing the vast controlled gusts of a recovering athlete. _It's fine. Ahh-hhhhmmm. It's fine_ , his voice almost a laugh before it began to break— _she was. Grace. She—_

Han heaved, stopped. It was October 1962, their baby was asleep in her bed. The bed Han made out of wood he'd chosen, not some scratched-steel, institutional—oh no, no. _Leia._ October 1962. He was a man; he was not a child, he was a man.

And so Han twisted, pressing hard into Leia's embrace. And so he kissed her as a man, hurt and unhurt hands alike hooking in the sides of her panties. _Off._ And Leia kissed back, Leia raised her hips to help the slip of silk, Leia pulled Han into consolation and heat and touch. It was too fast, rough, they were clumsy and electric with fatigue and adrenaline so it shouldn't have been so good—headboard into the wall, hard and rhythmic as his heart. It shouldn't have wrenched Han inside out like it did, it shouldn't have made Leia arch, scratch and shudder but the way—oh how—Han would not cry, he did not even cry out but at last he could let himself choke on her name, tremble and surrender in Leia's arms. Let himself come as close as he could, tonight, to sleep.


End file.
